Feng Shui Bagua

In Feng Shui, Bagua is a map - a visual representation of each aspect of your life and where a said aspect can be found inside of the home. For instance, at the heart (center) of a home we find Health. Both physical and mental manifestations occur toward the direct center of most household and as a side note this is consequently where most architectural designers tend to place the kitchen. This may come across as a handy little coincidence but on the contrary this is not a coincidence at all. The kitchen serves as a great centerpiece as it requires a great deal of energy to power up an oven and stove, so in other words, it is efficient to have this room as the center as then heat from the stove and oven will heat the rest of the home.

The term Bagua is Chinese, and it is defined conceptually as a fundamental concept of Feng Shui. Bagua is an 8 sided octagonal diagram of life aspects including: Career, Knowledge, Health, etc. A Bagua map exists to help visualize the link between life's aspects and a living space.

Feng Shui Bagua - Life Aspects

Bagua breaks down life into 9 general categories or aspects. Familiarize yourself with the following list of life aspects, they are in no particular order as of yet.

Career - (North)

Charity - (North West)

Knowledge - (North East)

Children - (West)

Health - (Center)

Ancestors - (East)

Wealth - (South East)

Fame - (South)

Relationships - (South West)

Before we dive into the Bagua Map, take some time to sketch out a floor plan of your household. Be sure to include labels as best you can. It isn't necessary to include furniture so much as you need to be aware of structural properties such as windows, walls, and doors. Stick to a basic floor plan sketch but include room names and labels.

The Bagua Map

A Bagua Map coordinates an aspect of your life with a location inside of the home tying together very specific personal aspects with a household. The map itself is not overly fancy, just a large square separated into 9 equal squares almost like a Tic-Tac-Toe board.

Each square is a visual representation of a life aspect. The boxes are also aligned according to directions like a reversed compass (N, NE, NW, S, SW, SE). For instance the top-middle square is said to be in the southern location and to box located just to the right of that box would be in the Southwest location. At the center of every map (the core of a home) is the most important aspect of any life - physical and emotional health.

With this in mind and using a sketch of your home we then use Bagua to map out problematic areas of a home. Then when we fill in the Bagua map with the correct life aspects we can see areas of our lives that can be improved through Feng Shui. The idea is that those problematic areas of your home like an unfinished basement or a disastrously cluttered closet space will fall under a certain life aspect when the Bagua map is placed over a sketch of your home. If that unkempt closet space falls within your Career aspect for example, your career is suffering as a result of an unorganized storage space.

Bagua Mapping Your Own Home

Bagua mapping is best done using one semi transparent piece of paper for the actual Bagua map and any plain piece of paper for the sketch of your home. A sketch doesn't have to be measured with absolution but try to keep things to scale. If the master bedroom takes up half of a floor, it should appear that way in your sketch.

With a completed floor plan sketch, a Bagua map can be applied over the top of the sketch aligning the bottom of the map with the edge of the house with the architectural "front door." Center the map left to right, but keep that bottom edge aligned with that door!

Empty Spaces

Realize that each home may not have a perfect square shape. Gaps and empty spaces in any floor plan are quite alright, these spaces make great places to host a garden, patio, or even a sun room addition. No action is required for the empty spaces so long as these spaces are clean and enhance the house itself in some way.

On the other hand, "squished" rooms or areas of the Bagua map that have little or no living space under them are very problematic. These areas need to be "filled" in immediately as a vacant map indicates a missing aspect of life. If this is the case extending a room, building a side patio, or planting a herb garden are all terrific ways to extend this area of your home to help extend that aspect of life.